


Speak of the Devil

by PhryneFicathon, whopooh



Category: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: Early Relationship, F/M, Meet The Robinsons - Freeform, office fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-11
Updated: 2018-12-11
Packaged: 2019-09-16 07:28:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16949643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PhryneFicathon/pseuds/PhryneFicathon, https://archiveofourown.org/users/whopooh/pseuds/whopooh
Summary: Phryne is visiting Jack at the station, but he’s not alone.





	Speak of the Devil

**Author's Note:**

  * For [aurora_australis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aurora_australis/gifts).



> For the prompt: Phryne meets some member(s) of Jack's family (biological or found), but it turns out she's already acquainted with them somehow. And also a little bit: “Opportunity is not a lengthy visitor.” /Into the Woods

As Phryne Fisher exits her car and walks the last steps to City South police station, there is a certain spring to her step. 

She has news she knows will please Jack – tidbits she gathered the evening before at Aunt Prudence’s about a suspect in one of his drawn-out cases. But as much as she loves to uncover puzzles, that is not the real reason for her good spirits. Those have rather to do with getting to see the Inspector again, after days without him. Her mind lingers on the kiss he gave her when they parted last Sunday afternoon, after a resplendent weekend together. 

She cannot help but smile at that. Who would have thought having Jack Robinson in an actual relationship would be so beneficial to her weekend routine? Having him at her dinner table and knowing he won’t put an end to the evening far too soon. Having him in her boudoir, allowing him to learn the terrain of her room as well as her body, without feeling it’s too much knowledge to impart on one single person. Having him in her bed when she wakes up in the morning, his absurdly early rising habits meaning he’s already awake and trying to stay still so as not to disturb her. 

That last thing she had to put an end to, making him promise to go about his own business and not walk on eggshells around her. He took the hint, which meant that on Sunday she woke up to him sitting next to her in bed, reading and looking incredibly relaxed, sheets gathered at his waist, tea at his side proving he’d been downstairs to scavenge the kitchen. Her heart beat faster when he reacted to her yawn by pulling her close to him, hands stroking her side without his eyes even once leaving the page in front of him. Not until her lips found his throat, at least, followed by her teeth, which left him no choice but to put the book aside. 

She was quite sure he didn’t regret it.

She hopes that distracting her inspector at the station might entice him to come visit earlier, and not wait until the coming weekend. Really, why would the man be so stubborn about that, saving all the pleasure for just two days in the week? She misses him and is positively an angel for having endured all the way to Wednesday. She takes the last steps to enter the police station. 

“Hello Hugh,” she beams at her second favourite policeman. 

“Miss Fisher,” Hugh exclaims, almost dropping the pen in his hand as he straightens to face her. “The Inspector is busy–“. 

But she’s already passed him, leaving him helplessly watching her back as she disappears through the Inspector’s door.

“Jack, you won’t believe what I learned yester–” Phryne begins. Then she stops, realising he has a guest. She hasn’t even considered that he wouldn’t just be there, alone, for her. 

A tall, blonde man, rather casually dressed in a brown suit and a knitted vest, is sitting in Jack’s guest chair, and he turns around to look at the intruder. She is just about to make an excuse when she senses there’s something familiar about this man; she frantically tries to place him. Is he a colleague? A suspect? Phryne Fisher doesn’t forget a face, and this is decidedly someone it was a pleasure to encounter. He is quite handsome, jaw set, frame slim, and his blue eyes are slowly clearing as he is also recognising her – yes, pleasure rather than business, she is certain of it; she may even have kissed that mouth. Ah yes! Now she remembers! The intriguing man she met at the Windsor half a year ago or so, allegedly a teacher but wickedly good at the piano, as it turned out in the small hours of the night.

“Miss Fisher!” Jack looks uncomfortable, blushing, and if she had paid him any attention, she would have seen the signs of a man very much wishing to pinch the bridge of his nose. She doesn’t, though, her eyes on the newcomer; her brain working intently on how to not make this moment too awkward. 

“I see you have still not mastered the art of knocking,” Jack continues, his voice half-soft, and it’s enough to make her look at him, smiling. He makes a gesture of introduction.

“Please, meet my brother, Mr Rupert Robinson. Rupert, this is Miss–.”

“Your brother!” she exclaims, eyes widening. 

“Miss _Fisher_ ,” Rupert says, equally surprised.

“You know each other.” Jack’s voice is flat. 

Of course they do. No, not of course, there is no reason they should – his brother isn’t even in Melbourne that often – but _of course_ they do. 

“You’ve met,” he adds, unnecessary.

“Rupert Robinson,” Phryne says, drawing out the syllables. Her eyes flutter between them, trying to take them in simultaneously, comparing. The one is slimmer and more casually dressed, hair slightly receding, smile open; the other is more guarded, with an adorably upturned nose and a jaw that clenches in a tell-tale way. For a moment, she feels guilty for having snogged Jack’s brother, even ever so shortly, but she quickly stems it. She hadn’t had any idea, and they had been nothing – well, not nothing, perhaps, but infuriatingly undecided – at the time. Besides, it isn’t as if she took him to her boudoir, as tempted as she might have been. She turns firmly to Jack, giving him her full focus, tilting her head. 

“We have. At the Windsor. Your brother is an excellent piano player.” Her eyes graze Rupert’s delicate hands for a second before her attention turns back to her lover. “Not too far from you, actually.”

Jack huffs out a laugh. His brother is ten times his superior in piano playing; he’s an _actual_ piano player, performing at bars and concerts beside his normal job. Jack tries to fight it, he really does, but against his wishes his gut erupts in jealousy, sending a heatwave through his body. If she’s enjoyed him play, considering her charisma and enthusiasm, what more has she enjoyed with him? His own brother – and Rupert was always the charming one, wasn’t he? It always came so much easier to him, the light-heartedness of conversation. And isn’t that an exact fit for Phryne? 

Jack wishes he was alone in the room, so he could sit down and bury his head in his hands for a moment. He thought he had killed those demons off – the fear of her past lovers – deciding it is none of his business what she did before, and that it doesn’t affect what they have now. He really has managed to see Phryne’s lovers as simply a part of her history. And then _this_ happens. He can feel his throat constrict, as he tries to breathe. 

Phryne is still looking between the brothers. 

“You don’t look particularly alike,” she muses aloud. She can’t believe she had stumbled upon Jack’s brother without noticing. The things she could have asked him if she only had realised! But they really don’t give the same impression; Rupert has nothing of Jack’s gravity, calm, and slightly hidden charm. And Robinson is such a common name. “I didn’t even know you had a brother, Jack. You’re such a secretive man.”

“Miss Fisher,” Rupert says, taking the steps forward to take her hand in his and kiss it before stepping back again, smiling broadly. “I had hoped I would run into you again when in Melbourne, but never could I imagine it would be at a police station.” He senses there is something happening in the room that he can’t grasp, a tension of some sort, and he decides to fill the void. “Are you here to report a crime? Has someone molested you? This is hardly a place for a lady like you.”

For a second the room turns completely silent; the only sound a small noise from outside, probably Hugh Collins stumbling on himself when retrieving a new cup of tea. Jack catches Phryne’s eye and bursts out laughing, Phryne immediately following suit. 

Rupert looks between them, their joint mirth a complete mystery, starting to shuffle uncomfortably as it seems they will never stop.

“What is so funny?” he finally asks.

“I’m sorry, Rupe,” Jack says, straightening himself. “You just… you don’t really know Miss Fisher that well, do you?”

“Only from the Windsor, that once,” Rupert answers, truthfully.

Jack’s mind is still full of questions, but as his eyes meet Phryne’s over the room, her eyebrow raised in challenge, he realises that he knows what he needs to know. His brother doesn’t know Phryne at all. He, Jack, is the one that knows all her quirks and abilities, interests and sore spots, the one she has chosen to be with. What happened before is old news.

He looks at his brother again.

“Do you remember I have mentioned a consultant detective to you, once or twice? The one who almost single-handedly took down an abortion ring, not to mention a human trafficking operation?” Rupert answers him with a nod. “That’s Miss Fisher.” 

Rupert’s eyes turn to her, his blue eyes impressed, and suddenly Phryne sees the family resemblance. 

“You are… the lady detective? _The_ lady detective?”

Phryne smiles broadly.

“So when you never made it to our dinner date, because you had to work, that was policework? With my brother?” 

Jack does a double take. There had been a dinner date, and he had interrupted it? Well, that was a first. For some reason it satisfies him immensely that he has been on _that_ end of an interrupted dinner for once.

“It must have been,” Phryne says and looks at Jack with a tiny smile. “He is quite irresistible.”

Rupert’s eyes dart between them and something dawns on him.

“This is what you were just about to tell me, wasn’t it, Jack? When you were talking about what had changed in your life?” 

He pauses, and Jack nods, blushing slightly and not meeting Phryne’s eyes. 

Rupert breathes in, contemplatively. “Speak of the devil.”

“… and she appears at your office door, obviously,” Phryne finishes, shrugging her shoulders, not minding one bit to be called the devil. 

She thinks for a moment, studying her Inspector for a second before turning to his brother.

“So, about that dinner date, Rupert. How about tonight, my place?” she says, making a pause for greater effect. “With your brother, _if_ he can spare the time although it’s only a Wednesday?” The last words are accompanied with a slightly pointed look Jack’s way.

Jack knows he is losing this battle, and frankly, he has no wish to win it. He simply nods; Rupert smiles and exclaims he would be delighted to come.

“Excellent,” Phryne says and turns to the door. “See you at seven, and I’ll leave you to your brothering until then.” 

As she walks out of the station, she realises she never gave Jack that gossip she had discovered. Well, she supposes she can tell him tomorrow morning, as he’ll try to sneak out of her bed to go to work. The thought makes her smile victoriously.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Fire_Sign for beta reading! And yes, I named Jack’s brother Rupert because of Rupert Penry-Jones being one of the actors in the upcoming _Miss Fisher and the Crypt of Tears_. It just seemed right.


End file.
